CDP Institute

Measurement partnerships must be in fashion. Measurement specialist Marketing Measurement Analytics (MMA) has joined Google’s Marketing Mix Model Partners program, which gives access to detailed information about ads on Google video, display, and search campaigns. These fuel estimates of campaign impact on online and offline sales. Meanwhile, Facebook and Integral Ad Science have extended their relationship, providing independent measurement of ad viewability and fraud across Facebook, Instagram, and the Facebook Audience Network.

So many robots, so little time. Dynamic content generator Wylei has launched an AI-powered, SaaS-based “Optimization Cloud” that uses automated testing to optimize personalized email, Facebook, video, and display ads. Marketers upload their assets and the system automatically tests which combinations work best for which customer micro-segments. The company says it has improved conversion rates by 35% to 200%.

Ad tech vendor PulsePoint has upgraded Story by PulsePoint, which uses AI to manage content marketing programs across social media, native, and content discovery platforms. It optimizes for post-click engagement, not just lowest cost per click.

Blueshift creates personalized messages for email, Web sites, and mobile apps. It partners with several Customer Data Platform vendors to help assemble the unified profiles that drive those messages. The company just launched an “AI-Powered Cross-Channel Visual Journey Builder” that runs manually-designed campaigns but uses AI to decide when to add customers to each campaign and to personalize the choice of products and contents offered within campaign messages.

“Digital transformation” can describe many types of change. But this Accenture study paints a specific picture of a future where subscription services replace traditional pick-it-off-the-shelf retail. The accompanying survey found that 63% of consumers would consider automatic replenishment of household goods like detergent and 24% would let brands select products for them automatically.

Subscriptions may be a long-term threat to retail, but the immediate danger comes from online shopping. PriceLocal helps local stores fight back by hijacking Amazon business. Consumers install a browser extension that watches their Amazon searches and can place orders for same day pickup at local stores at the Amazon Prime price. The service just added 10,000 new stores to its roster, including Target, Walmart, Bed Bath & Beyond, Office Depot, Fry’s, and Toys R Us.

If subscription services replace retailers and consumers shop mostly within closed systems like Amazon and Facebook, it gets really hard for advertising to have an impact. But until that happens, Dentsu Aegis Network hopes to target all ads at specific (though anonymized) individuals. It has just launched M1, a “people-based marketing platform” that assigns a persistent anonymized ID to every adult in the U.S. and can synch that ID with publishers’ own IDs. It currently has 242 million anonymized profiles based on actual name, address, and/or email address.

Let’s do news from CDP vendors today. Tealium announced new capabilities to stream data into cloud computing platforms including Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure. Key benefits include real-time data collection, prebuilt connectors for more than 1,000 source systems, and transformation of data before it is fed into destination systems.

Next: Datorama added a connector to social intelligence aggregator DataSift. Specifically, Datorama customers will be able to load anonymized and aggregated LinkedIn data gathered by DataSift and exposed through its Media Strategies API. DataSift launched the API last month and has several partners using it. Datorama integrates and exposes customer data from multiple sources.  This makes it a true CDP, although the company focuses primarily on using the data for marketing performance measurement.

And one more: AgilOne has placed its Customer Data and Engagement Hub on the Oracle Cloud Marketplace, offering an integration to deliver messages through Oracle Responsys. Oracle still draws its Marketing Cloud with the BlueKai DMP in the position of a CDP, but clients who want a real CDP will need something like AgilOne.

Email marketers just want to do better email.  A survey from email vendor Emma found that 37% said they most want to do more targeted marketing, compared with just 23% who wanted to do cross-channel campaigns. Automating more work and content testing tied for last at 12%. The biggest barriers were lack of staff (34%) and time (30%), far ahead of inadequate data (16%) or software (10%). Other interesting data in there too.

Back in April, Experian announced it was selling a majority stake its cross-channel marketing unit to Vector Capital and Peter McCormick, co-founder of ExactTarget. The new company just announced its name will be Cheetah Digital, restoring the CheetahMail brand that was the core of the Experian unit. The new operation will offer a SaaS-based digital marketing platform that assembles customer data and executes cross-channel campaigns.